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Tuesday, 18 November 2014

Welcome to Sex Mountain: Remote religious site where married men, housewives and politicians go to have sex with strangers... to bring themselves good luck

It’s one of the world’s most bizarre and best kept secrets of Indonesia.

In
the world’s largest Muslim majority country, thousands of Indonesian
pilgrims travel to the Gunung Kemukus, otherwise known as ‘Sex Mountain’
in Central Java, to have sex with strangers as part of a religious
ritual

Dateline video journalist, Patrick Abboud, whose story is set to show on SBS, got to uncover the incredible life on top of the mountain, given unusual access to what goes on.

Mr Abboud says every 35 days you have to perform sex seven consecutive times for the ritual to work.

‘It’s
a pretty bizarre story. A few years ago I read a piece about it and
looked into it, it took a while to get there,’ he said.

And what he found he described as ‘incredibly surprising’.

‘It was hard to make sense of it, after being there it took a few weeks to digest.’

Dateline video journalist, Patrick
Abboud (pictured) covered the bizzare story of the Sex Mountain and
found it interesting and awkward

The
ancient ritual dates back to the 16th century and is a regular meeting
of ritual believers participating in sexual acts, with the view that it
brings good luck and fortune.

From married men, housewives, government officials and prostitutes, there’s a variety of people who participate.

And
for a country and religion where sex out of wedlock is taboo, Mr Abboud
says the idea of a mountain top sex ritual for Muslims in Indonesia
seems very strange.

‘Back in the 16th century, a young Indonesian prince had an affair with his step mother,’ he said.

‘They ran away to the mountain and had sex and mid coitus they were caught, killed and buried.

‘There
is a shrine there now and because they didn’t get to finish the act,
others believe that if you do, fortune will come to you, most people
like poor farmers who want to get ahead in life.’

He says he saw no Westerners there but people come from all over Indonesia to see if their luck would change.

‘It’s
a Javanese ritual which is very different to the Muslim world, very
different to everywhere else in Indonesia, the beliefs are a blend of
Islamic, Hindi and Buddhism,’ he said.

So
popular the ritual has now turned into a tourist attraction for locals
with the government charging people to go there, with stalls and even
buskers.

‘It’s a bit of a carnival.’

‘It’s
contradictory, the government knows adultery is happening yet they’re
preaching something different and turning a blind eye,’ he said.

While
Mr Abboud, who was fascinated by the ritual, said the only problem is
that there is more men than women and in turn it has become prime
territory for commercial sex workers.

He even got propositioned himself by a sex worker whilst filming but said he quickly declined the offer.

He said seeing inside doings of the religious ritual, it seems very controversial.

Back in the days people used to have
sex out in the open but now there are a number of huts that people can
sex in behind closed doors

'I
think there's a growing contradiction with Sex Mountain, there's the
prostitution, so how it is possible this is all being condoned by the
government and religious leaders,' he said.

'The one thing is the problem of sexually transmitted diseases, there's health clinics set up at mountain.'

'I talked to a doctor and he said most sex workers have sexual diseases and men don’t use condoms, so HIV is on the up.'

The
Dateline video journalist was lucky enough to follow some pilgrims to
the mountain and talked to them about their experiences.

'It
took a lot of convincing, as it is adulterous, I followed them, some
came by boat or motorbike, from right across Indonesia and I had access
to friends and people before they got there.'

So popular the ritual has now turned
into tourist attraction for locals with the government charging people
to get, with stalls buskers

Mr Abboud followed a female pilgrim called Mardiyah who was a widow and for two years had struggled financially.

Living in a small Javanese town, she had just completed her mission of having sex seven times when he was there.

'She said business become better and made more money, it's maybe proof it does work,' he said.

'I met a male pilgrim called Gepeng, and his friends but he didn't want to kiss and tell.'

'One
of his friends said they went for fun and karaoke, another said he does
go for the sex ritual but didn't want to say too much because he didn't
want his wife to find out, but felt his life would turn around.'

He also described another pilgrim he met that also didn't want to talk too much about it in fear of his wife finding out.

'It's Incredibly hard to get women talking, obviously cheating on their husband.'

While
he found the incredibly bizarre sex ritual confronting and rather
'awkward' to film and talk about, he said there was nothing unsafe or
dangerous about it.

'Quite
beautiful prayers, they give beautiful offerings of flowers, at the
grave of shrine people get teary and pray for hours on end.'

'Never felt in any threat, it was a nice environment.'

He did however feel what needed to be mentioned is that the religion was not specific of Islam.

'It's not something to demonise the religion,' he said, 'it's not strictly Islam as we know it.'

'You'll
never find any ritual like this in any part of the Muslim world and
Indonesia, Javanese interpretation is much more liberal.'